Writing, life, and my fundamental lack of maturity and discipline.

Testing...testing...does this thing still work?

Wow.  What's it been, six months?  Well, sometimes we need to take these little breaks. I had a friend ask me not too long ago about why I hadn't blogged in so long.  I posited at length about the effects of work-life balance, the hit-and-run, instant gratification of Facebook, the demands of my job, (which are substantial), my ongoing, low-level grief (which totally, totally, sucks)...

It came down to this, however:  I am undisciplined. 

Writers write every day.  Even when they don't feel like writing.  Me?  I write when the muse moves within me and the result is that I puke out a first draft and publish it.  I wonder why, really -- my job is to write stuff, and I almost never publish a first draft of anything I write at work.  I am exceptionally careful, diligent and thoughtful, engaging in multiple edits and re-writes until the words are pithy and shine with reason and wit.  So why don't I put that same dogged determination in my hobby writing?

(Has my boss stopped reading this yet?  OK, that's not really true -- I puke out a lot of first drafts at work, too.  Don't tell anyone)

Real writers?  They punish themselves through 500 words a day and they do it day in and day out and...well, that just sounds like WORK to me...

Anyway, so here we are.  It's autumn, the elections are over (because you seriously didn't want to hear my political rants this season -- for real), and we're sliding into the holidays.  And I thought it was probably time to start writing again.  Because maybe the effort is worth it.  I'm not feeling creative enough and being creative is important. 

So stay tuned. With any luck, I'll actually find something useful to say, instead of running all over this page like a puppy that slipped her leash. Only time will tell.


(I, I, I, me, me, me  -- good gracious!)